


The Mascot

by SleepsWithCoyotes



Series: Mascotverse [9]
Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: M/M, Not Crisis Core Compliant, Polyamory, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2017-03-25
Packaged: 2018-10-10 09:45:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10434972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SleepsWithCoyotes/pseuds/SleepsWithCoyotes
Summary: What do you do with a drunken SOLDIER?





	

**Author's Note:**

> Archiving old fic from 2006!
> 
> When the subject of Zackfluff came up, mistressnashya mentioned that "a very drunk but too cute for words Zack all cuddled up on the floor in pillows holding a Cloud plushie" was something she felt she ought to draw. And I said "OMG, do that and I will _write_ drunken Zack cuteness!" (Spoiler: She drew it. XD) This was actually supposed to be a one-shot, but it's only ever a fifty-fifty chance with me that a one-shot won't bloom into...well, _this._ Fic upon fic sort of radiated outward; OCs were created, migrated to oneshots, other series and even other fandoms; it grew three ending arcs like a choose your own adventure and was written almost completely out of order. This fic is a virus and is still one of the things I'm probably happiest with having written in the end. :3

Freezing winds, the threat of ice, and three to six inches of dirty snow had the city in its grip, but Midgar kept its festival air with a stubbornness that bordered on the perverse, possibly the insane. Cloud had never seen so many people on the street at once, had never seen the streets so _bright_ \--candles glowing in frosted windows, strings of blinking lights hung up along the eaves and doorways, twined around streetlamps. He was reliably informed that there would be a parade later, starting in Sector One and wending all the way up to Shinra Headquarters, and that only half the marchers and floats would be official.

"Sounds like a security risk to me," he'd said, and Zack had thumped him on the back, laughing out loud.

Are you kidding? Even the terrorists will be drunk tomorrow. It's a New Year's tradition!"

So it was probably a good thing that Zack had been furloughed at the same time as Cloud's unit, that General Sephiroth had given them all _three whole days,_ the holiday and the weekend after, because the entire point of New Year's was to get as drunk as humanly possible, and Zack had a thing for tradition. Like the tradition that said their unit--of which Zack considered himself an honorary member--had to find something creative to do to the President's statue--or steal it--on Founder's Day. Or the one that said _somebody_ had to dress up like the Allfather, eye patch and staff and ragged cloak and all, and tell everyone in uniform their fortune--they usually ran to alcohol, women, or public humiliation--on Midwinter.

And the tradition that said the newest member of the unit was the one who got to look after whichever hotshot SOLDIER wandered into their section, bored or drunk or with a chip on his shoulder...only that one had somehow fallen by the wayside. Two newer guys had come in since Cloud first got saddled with the job, and somehow he was still trailing along after Zack like a fully-trained, highly-armed puppy. Or something like that.

He'd been dreading the idea of trying to sober Zack up the morning after if Zack followed the tradition of getting horribly, horribly drunk on New Year's, but it was different when he had two extra days to do it in. Who said General Sephiroth couldn't be merciful?

And anyway, Cloud told himself as he was carried along by the crowds, maybe it wouldn't be so bad. Zack wasn't actually going to any of the parties, nor was he hanging around the barracks with the rest of the guys who lived too far away to go home. He was supposed to be spending New Year's with his girlfriend, with his girlfriend's _mother,_ and unless her family was more relaxed than Cloud's had ever been, there'd be a good deal less alcohol than it took to get Zack drunk.

Which meant that Cloud was off-duty--completely off-duty, even as a friend--and...he still wasn't sure how that translated to 'required to storm Midgar with the other bachelors,' but it beat staying in.

He'd been leery when they dragged him off the Plate and down to Sector Six, but the neon bustle of Wall Market had been transformed like the rest of the city. It now looked less like an entrenched and fortified bazaar and more like a carnival, rickety stands thrown up in every available space offering food, hot drinks, games and diversions. The woman at the fortuneteller's booth didn't look like she was having nearly as much fun as Zack had in his eye patch and ratty grey cloak, though.

"Hey, Cloud!" someone yelled, and he looked around until he spotted a waving arm: Guz, standing at one of the shooting galleries. "C'mere and help me cheat this guy out of a stuffed moogle, will ya?"

Guzman's girlfriend was standing at his side, her kid sister slung on her hip, and Cloud hoped he wasn't blushing, sorry now that he'd forgotten their names. He hadn't actually expected to meet them, and he wondered why Guz had called _him_ over when there were much better shots in their unit.

Guz's girlfriend was smiling, though, and as Cloud slouched uncertainly over to him, Guz was saying, "Cloud'll have it in three shots, just watch. He kicks my a--er, _butt_ in marksmanship every time."

The little girl was giggling, trying to stuff long blond pigtails into her mouth until her sister jounced her a few times to make her shriek happily and hold on with both arms.

"You teach Sara to curse, and I'm telling mom."

"Aww, baby, not your mother! Uh...you think she'd like a stuffed moogle too? What about that potted plant over there? Cloud, help me out, man--Marla's mom makes the general look like a sweet old lady."

"You're never going to get tired of the hair jokes, are you?" Cloud asked, shaking his head.

"Didn't plan on it, nope. So? Do your stuff, kid!"

Cloud stepped up to what looked like a mounted toy rifle with a sigh. This wasn't going to be pretty. "What exactly am I supposed to be doing?"

"Well, first I give the evil man some gil," Guz said, eyeing the smiling fellow behind the counter with mock ire and putting down a one-gil piece. "Then _you_ get three shots to hit anything on that wall. Go for the red ones," he advised, digging an elbow into Cloud's ribs. "Sara likes moogles, see."

The back wall of the stand was lined with row upon row of bottles in bright materia colors, and they were large enough that Cloud wondered where the 'chance' part of the game came in. Surely even Guz could hit _one._ Glancing up at the prizes hanging overhead, he saw strings of plastic jewelry and blitzballs in netting, funny hats and toy swords and plush animals, a few plush dolls. There was even a stuffed Allfather up there, and Cloud considered putting a gil down himself and leaving the one-eyed doll for Zack to find.

"That's right--knock one over, and you win a prize," the barker sing-songed, breaking into his spiel. "Three chances for a gil, cheap at any price. Step on up and test your skill!"

 _They're six feet away,_ he almost said, but sheer paranoia kept him silent. Whenever someone tried to get him to do something that looked too easy, it usually was.

Bending over to fit his shoulder to the stock of the toy rifle, he took a long look down the barrel, stilled his body completely, and squeezed the trigger. The report sounded oddly muffled, and he blinked to see a beanbag eject instead of a bullet, tumbling through the air to smack limply against the back wall, two inches from a red bottle.

Huh. So it pulled to the right.

He heard laughter behind him, Guz assuring his girlfriend that they were all much, much better--really--with actual guns, but Cloud refused to listen to it. He remembered where the tip of the barrel had pointed just before he fired, so he moved it back there, shifted it a couple of degrees to the left, and pulled the trigger again.

 _Swish, rattle, splat._ Still a fraction off. The corner of the beanbag had brushed the bottle in passing, enough to make it wobble, but not enough to knock it off the thin wooden beam it balanced on. He still had one more shot, though, so he moved the barrel a fraction, forced his hands steady, and fired one more time.

_Swish, **bang!**_

"Ha! See? What'd I tell you? That's why Cloud whips me on the firing range every time!" Guz announced, as proud as if he'd done it himself. "She'd like a moogle, please," he added to the man behind the counter, who looked remarkably blasé about the entire thing. He probably raked in ten times more gil than he spent on the prizes; no doubt he had every reason to smile.

Cloud hadn't quite moved away from the counter, watching Sara reach with a delighted squeal for the stuffed creature and seriously considering that Odin plushie, when a big hand came down on top of his head, ruffling his hair before he could duck away. "Nice shooting there, kid," a cheerful, only mildly-slurred voice poured into his ear, and Cloud sighed and gave in to the inevitable as an arm was slung casually around his shoulders.

"Sir," Guz said with a blink. "I, er, thought you had plans, or we'd have invited you--"

"Hey, hey! Don't call me that when we're out of uniform-- _Private Guzman,_ " Zack teased, leaning hard on Cloud to see if he'd stagger. Zack couldn't possibly be drunk enough to need Cloud to hold him up...Cloud hoped. "And this must be the lovely lady you keep bragging about--Marla, right?"

"Yes, sir," she said in a rush, cheeks already pink, and then blushed in earnest when she realized what she'd said. "Um, I mean--"

Zack was laughing already, looking sidelong at Cloud with a wicked grin. "Check it out, Cloud. She's already got better reflexes than half the guys we know. Why can't we get more like her to enlist, huh?"

"Because they're afraid you'll make them steal a statue...sir?" Cloud asked innocently, and Zack ruffled his hair again, still leaning on him so he couldn't get away.

"I am surrounded by an army of comedians," Zack told Marla solemnly, and by then he had her smiling too.

Her smile faded a little when her kid sister, who'd been regarding Zack with huge, fascinated eyes, held out the stuffed moogle in both hands.

"What's this?" Zack asked, arching his brows like he'd never seen anything like it. "Is that a moogle?"

Sara nodded, pigtails bouncing.

"Well, that's got to be the cutest moogle I've seen in my life," Zack declared, reaching out to poke it in the stomach with one pointing finger. Giggling, Sara pulled it back, hiding most of her face behind its head, but she peered up at Zack with a shy grin.

Part of Cloud was busy being impressed that Zack was good with _everything,_ even kids, but the rest of him was watching the way Marla's smile went strangely relieved. What did she think Zack was going to do, take the stuffed moogle from the kid and _eat_ it? But Marla wasn't watching Zack's face; she was staring at his eyes, violet glowing over grey, like he was using his materia all the time. SOLDIER eyes, always a little strange.

"Hey, you think I should get one for myself?" Zack asked the kid, managing to look thoughtful as he went back to trying to knock Cloud over, leaning all of his weight on Cloud's shoulder. And damn it, Zack wasn't _that_ much taller than him, but Zack out-massed him in solid muscle as well, and it dipped Cloud's shoulders like an uneven set of balances. "Because that is _really_ cute--just the thing for field missions, right?"

Sara was nodding again, grinning widely, and Guz chuckled as he wrapped an arm around Marla's waist. "But we already have a mascot, sir," he said, glancing pointedly at Cloud.

"Sure, the _unit_ does," Zack agreed, ignoring Cloud's growl of protest, "but what about _me?_ Don't I deserve a mascot?"

"Oh, well, of _course_ you do, sir," Guz agreed with a wise nod. "And nothing says 'SOLDIER First Class' like a stuffed moogle."

"It's only because they're not giving away chattering teeth," Cloud grumbled, opening and closing the fingers of one hand like a babbling mouth. And he was _not_ the unit mascot. The unit mascot was a plastic cactuar holding a bottle of tequila, which occasionally struck Cloud as morbid in the extreme.

"Yeah, yeah. Mock me in my time of woe," Zack accused, but he was smiling when he stood up straight and flipped a coin at the counter. "Just remember, I was watching you the whole time."

"Step right up!" the barker began amiably. "Knock one over, you win a prize. Three chances for a--"

_Swish, **bang!**_

"Gil," Zack said with a cheeky grin, watching the red bottle spin wildly and topple off the shelf. "I know."

Cloud stared, wide-eyed, but Guz burst out laughing, and even Marla gave Zack an admiring smile. "That's SOLDIER for you!"

"Will that be another moogle, sir?" the barker asked, wide-eyed and uncertain, as if Zack had been having him on. Which was possible, but Cloud rather doubted it. A stuffed moogle would be just _like_ Zack. Maybe he'd take it to his--

Why _wasn't_ he with his girlfriend today?

"Yeah, sure--hey, wait. Let me have that Tyr over there instead," Zack said, eyes lighting up, and Cloud realized with a start that Zack's heart hadn't really been in it until then.

For whatever reason, the guy behind the counter looked at _Cloud_ before he hooked the toy down from the rafters.

It was...well, it was Tyr. It had a spear in one hand and a sword in the other, and it was very...blond. Very spiky and blond, and with the bright blue eyes--

 _"Zack,"_ he began, thinking vaguely that if he just got _between_ Zack and the doll, maybe Zack would get distracted and lose interest--but before he could fling himself between his friend and certain death by teasing, Zack had grabbed the doll in both hands and was holding it up for all to see.

"Check it out! Does this not look _exactly_ like Cloud?"

"Congratulations, sir," Guzman, the traitorous bastard, offered. "One for you and one for the unit, huh?"

"Nah. Today I'm going to be greedy and take them both. We've got some serious drinking to do, don't we Cloud?"

Cloud stared in abject horror. Zack had addressed that last bit to the _doll._

"Sure, fine, whatever," he mumbled, wondering how it was that doom and Zack went hand in hand and still always managed to surprise him. Then again, if he waited until Zack was drunk enough, maybe he could _take_ the doll....

"Great! So let's go! Nice meeting you, miss," he said to Marla, and "miss," to Sara with a wink, then considered Guzman for a long moment before waving negligently in his direction. "Eh. I'll see _you_ around the base. Eventually."

"Heartwarming, sir," Guz said with a tolerant smirk.

Zack already had a hand wrapped around Cloud's arm, tugging him towards the crowds, but he looked back to wave the doll over his shoulder--and Cloud's--with a grin. He was fast enough to yank it out of Cloud's reach, too.

"Come on, Zack, I _know_ you," Cloud tried to growl, though he was afraid it sounded closer to a whimper. "What are you going to do with that thing?"

"'That thing?' That _thing_ is the great Tyr," Zack said loftily, shaking the doll to make its fluffy spikes wave in emphasis, "god of battle, patron spirit of valor and Doing the Right Thing."

Cloud could actually hear the capitals when Zack started talking like that. Zack liked to say it was a gift.

"And see? He's got that cute little glare you do. He's mostly eyes and hair anyway--"

Cloud made a lunge for it, ignoring the vise masquerading as a hand that was clapped around his arm, and--damn it, Zack's arms were longer. Which was probably a good thing, because when Cloud missed, his momentum almost planted him face-first in the bare chest of the guy running a Strongest Man competition outside the local gym. If Zack hadn't reeled him back with a laugh, he might have expired of embarrassment on the spot...or had his head crushed between the guy's massive pecs as he flexed.

"You want to come up against Big Bro, little boy?" the strongman asked, and Cloud wasn't sure which worried him most: the way the guy had asked that, or the fact that the bodybuilder was standing out here in near-freezing temperatures wearing nothing but a Speedo.

"Wouldn't be a fair fight, old man," Zack said, which at least got Big Bro's eyes off Cloud for a moment. "I'm in SOLDIER," he explained...then whipped up the doll, shook it cheerfully, and jerked his head at Cloud. "And he's the Great God Tyr."

 _"Zack!_ Let's _go,"_ Cloud groaned, and it was his turn to grab someone by the arm and start hauling. Zack didn't drag his feet too much, just enough to make Cloud work at it, which gave Zack time to grin at the strongman before they disappeared into the crowd.

"Sorry, old man! You'll have to get your own!"

"Damn it, Zack, could you _please_ not embarrass me in front of strange, mostly-naked men?"

He almost stumbled when Zack started walking normally, and cringed when Zack cleared his throat. "Er, you didn't... _want_ to come up ag--"

"Finish that thought, and I will make you pay. Sir!"

Zack's warm laughter let him know, kindly, that he'd been had yet again, and then Zack caught up to him in barely two strides, so Cloud had to let him go. It would've looked weird for him to be hanging on to Zack's arm like a kid or a girl, though Zack could get away with it just fine.

"Lighten up on the 'sir,' huh? I even dressed down for the occasion."

Cloud couldn't resist a glance, though he'd seen Zack in his civvies before. They were both in jeans and their on-duty boots, bundled up in sweaters and their heavy, Shinra-issue peacoats, but there was really no comparison. Out of uniform Cloud looked completely normal, like any guy off the street, whereas Zack looked impressive no matter what he wore. He _looked_ like a soldier going home for the holidays, the son everybody was proud of and the favorite older brother, the one that played with the kids and listened to the old people tell the same tired stories and kept smiling, and...who could ever be nervous around _Zack?_ Was Guzman's girlfriend nuts?

"You'd have frozen halfway here if you hadn't," Cloud muttered, glaring straight ahead again. "Where are we going, anyway?" And where the hell was Zack's girlfriend? She hadn't pulled a Marla, had she?

Zack's arm settled heavy and solid over his shoulders, not dragging at him this time, just _there._ "There's a bar down here that doesn't care how old you are," Zack told him with a grin, adding, "but don't worry. I'll get you back to barracks."

Cloud blinked up at him, incredulous. "You'll get _me_ back to barracks? And who do you think's going to be putting you to bed? The general?"

Something...odd moved behind Zack's eyes before his smile grew to cover it, and he pretended to consider the matter with due seriousness. "Hmm...Sephiroth could put me to bed if he wanted to, I guess. But since he's more likely to leave me out in the snow on the parade ground to see if I'll learn my lesson, I suppose I'll have to leave it to the Great God Tyr."

 _Shake, shake, shake._ Tyr's hair really did bear a startling resemblance to Cloud's when it stuck up like that.

"It's a _doll,"_ Cloud explained with great patience. "It's not going to put you to bed."

"Hey, I've been put to bed by plenty of dolls!" Zack protested with a campy leer. "Just not _recently."_

If that wasn't an opening, Cloud didn't know what was.

"Zack? I thought you were going to spend the day with your girlfriend."

Zack got quiet, but he didn't remove his arm. "She wasn't there," he said after a moment, and he sounded _tired._ "Her mom...well, her mom doesn't really like me, so I didn't get the whole story, but I guess there's this guy from the Turks who's been after her for a while now. It's funny--I'm not even sure if she's _out_ with the guy or if she's out to get _away_ from the guy."

It didn't sound funny to Cloud. It sounded like it sucked.

"And she didn't...I don't know, leave a message or anything?" Cloud asked, trying to reconcile what Zack was telling him now with all the things Zack had said before. That girl--Aeris? Cloud was _horrible_ with names--hadn't seemed like the type to just run out on someone.

"You know? That's the thing. She probably did. But I'm not sure her mom would've given it to me. Elmyra hates Shinra and everyone associated with it, and she used to be a soldier's wife, too. Now she just thinks we're bad news," Zack said slowly, "and I don't know. Maybe she's right."

And that was what was bothering Zack, Cloud realized with a jolt. Not that he might've been stood up, but wondering whether he _deserved_ to be.

"I mean," Zack said, oddly wistful, "if you were in trouble...you'd go to someone who could _help,_ right?"

It took Cloud a minute to realize that Zack was talking about his girl, wondering why she hadn't come to him, why she was doing whatever-it-was on her own.

"No," Cloud said gruffly, staring at the lights and the crowds, anywhere but at Zack. "I'd come to you. Even if you just made things worse, I'd be too busy plotting your downfall to notice."

Zack made a soft, surprised sound, and Cloud couldn't have turned to look after _that_ if he'd tried...but then Zack started laughing again, arm shifting to loop around his neck and drag him close while Zack's other hand, the one still holding the doll, made an electric mess of his hair.

"Yeah," Zack said as Cloud struggled free, "okay."

They were still heading towards the bar, but Cloud was reasonably certain he'd be dragging a cheerful drunk into the barracks in a few hours, not a soggy, morose one.

Of course, the morose ones probably talked less.

***

The funny thing about Cloud was...well, no, you couldn't laugh at the guy--or, okay, you _could,_ but you shouldn't, because he was damned cute, but he sometimes took it wrong. But the funny thing, if you weren't laughing _at_ him, and if you'd first teased him nonverbal so he caught on to the fact that you didn't mean anything by it, was that he was as loyal as they came. He'd stand by you through anything, even if he thought you were a chocobo short of a racing sheet. No, _especially_ then.

Like now for instance. Cloud couldn't drink and was smart enough to know it, so he'd had the one glass he couldn't get out of--the first drink was always a shot of tequila, in honor of the kid's unit--and after that he stuck to other things, watching Zack put it away with a faintly disbelieving look that never entirely disappeared. Which was also cute, because Cloud knew all about the accelerated metabolism that went along with being a SOLDIER. If Zack wanted to get drunk, these days he had to work at it.

And yeah, he knew what Cloud was thinking. 'Poor guy, stood up by Miss Perfect; he deserves to get plastered.' And that loyalty thing, Cloud getting pissed off on Zack's behalf--that just made him grin and want to mess up the kid's hair again, because friends didn't level up like materia, but he'd gotten one who'd already mastered the concept.

Cloud was all wrong about why he was drinking, though. He hadn't been stood up. He was pretty sure he was being kept out of the line of fire.

And that really bothered him. He was a SOLDIER, for pity's sake. First Class. If some hotshot from the Turks wanted to make a nuisance of himself, one look at Zack would probably convince the guy to go find his own. And if that didn't do it, he'd find some other way to take care of things. A word to the guy's supervisors--a word to Sephiroth if he had to, not that he ever wanted to trade on their friendship, not for anything he couldn't do for himself. But if it wasn't just some asshole trying to wear down a girl who didn't even want him, if it was one of those other things, the things he wasn't supposed to notice....

Like the way things grew for her, even in the shade. The way she made him feel better than he had since they shot him up with mako, better than he'd _ever_ felt, maybe. The way she talked to people who weren't there, but only if she thought no one was listening.

If that were the reason she was being followed, then he guessed he could see her point. Shinra wanted something from her, and he worked for Shinra. It was like some bad novel, but it was worse because she _was_ Miss Perfect, everything he'd ever wanted and some things he hadn't known about until he came to Midgar.

Aeris knew about Sephiroth. Hell, she knew about Cloud--wanted to _meet_ Cloud, point of fact. That had been the plan, even: he'd stop by her place, and if they just happened to wander down to Sector Six, and just _happened_ to bump into Cloud, then hey, at least the poor guy wouldn't run.

He was pretty sure now that Cloud wouldn't run, but he was less sure about Aeris. Not because she'd want to, but for his own good.

Waving the bartender over again with a sigh, he picked up the plush Tyr that had been sitting on the counter by his elbow, staring at its glaring blue eyes. Cloud's fingers twitched around his glass, but he didn't grab for it this time, not yet. Who knew it'd be so difficult to keep a stuffed god out of the hands of one guy? And Cloud not even in SOLDIER. Yet.

"What do you say, Cloud? Whiskey or another tequila?" he asked without looking up.

"If you don't stop talking to that thing," Cloud muttered, "they're going to have you _committed."_

"Nah. They'd have done it already if they were going to. I don't understand what you've got against Tyr, though. I mean, look at him! He's cute, he's quiet, he's got great hair.... Hey, you're not _jealous,_ are you?" he asked, giving Cloud a wide-eyed innocent look that hadn't fooled his own mother. "You know I love you best, right?"

"And not only are they going to commit you," Cloud said through gritted teeth, "the nice man behind the bar isn't going to serve you any more alcohol."

"Are you kidding?" the bartender asked, wiping dry another glass and setting it down before Zack. "We get SOLDIERs in here all the time, kid."

Zack blinked. "You know, considering that I've been talking to a stuffed god for the past two hours, I don't think I'm drunk enough to take offense at that."

"Nope," the bartender agreed complacently. "And I'll keep serving you until you do."

He had to laugh, flashing the bartender a salute with the hand that still held Tyr--and whipping the doll out of the way when Cloud made a reflexive grab for it. Really, it was just like teasing a cat. "Can't argue with that. Whiskey, please, and something for my friend."

"Coffee," Cloud said, dropping his head into his hand. "Lots and lots of coffee."

Yep. Loyal as they came.

He really would have liked to spend the holiday with both of them, only then he might start to feel greedy.

***

Although Zack liked to act as if he were part of Cloud's unit, he was not, in fact, an army regular. Zack wasn't a regular _anything,_ and Cloud never forgot it. So when it was time to haul Zack's only semi-coordinated, entirely-too-heavy ass to bed, Cloud snuck them in the back way and, rather than heading for the enlisted men's barracks, struck out boldly into SOLDIER territory instead.

Not that there was any risk involved when he was lugging around a SOLDIER First Class, or even without wearing Zack like a free pass. The other SOLDIERs had seen him around so often, their eyes slid right off him. It didn't do much for his pride, but it meant the only thing he had to concentrate on was keeping Zack reasonably upright until they reached his room.

Unless General Sephiroth happened by, that is. If that happened, then Zack was going to get a talking-to, and Cloud would have to stand there, trying not to sag as Zack got heavier and heavier the closer he came to passing out, and endure Sephiroth's patient sigh and the _"Oh, go on. He can't hear me anyway."_

Zack could, though--he was never quite as drunk as he seemed--and Sephiroth had to know it, and Cloud had never quite figured out where he fit into their game, whether he was the referee or the blitzball, or maybe the bait.

They managed not to run into the general, though he saw a suspicious flutter of black just before a passing SOLDIER opened Zack's door for him so Cloud wouldn't have to juggle both doorplate and drunk. "Thanks," Cloud muttered, yanking Zack inside, and the SOLDIER who'd helped them tossed him a friendly grin, the kind you'd give a puppy when it mastered a trick.

"Anytime," the walking behemoth said, eyes glittering gold as he tapped the lockplate a second time, the door sliding closed between them.

At least he'd made it, and Zack perked up when he realized he was in his own room, smiling at the bed as if he thought he could charm it into coming to him instead of the reverse. "Guess it's pretty late, huh?" Zack said, his words running together into a cheerful drawl as he tightened his arm around Cloud's shoulders.

"It's not like we have to get up tomorrow," Cloud said, which was _like_ an answer. Zack didn't seem to mind.

"Sleeping in s'good. Me and Cloud are gonna sleep 'til noon," he said, waving that damned plushie one more time.

The doll was mocking him. Tyr no longer had a spear--Zack had managed to cut the stuffed felt weapon out of the doll's hands with his boot knife, and now it just had the sword. It was a really big sword, too, a lot like Zack's, and so what if he'd been practicing that weapon in his spare time?

"Cloud is over here," he growled, "and Cloud's not sleeping with you."

The look Zack gave him was positively stricken, and Cloud actually felt bad before he realized Zack probably thought he meant to take the stupid plushie on his way out. And he did. Just as soon as he regained control over his limbs, which seemed to have frozen right about the time his mouth went dry, and his stomach went wobbly, and everything like thought went sailing right out of his head.

You could actually see the grey in Zack's eyes from this close, the flecks of blue under the faint mako glow.

"Why not?" Zack asked, and it occurred to Cloud that maybe Zack hadn't been talking about the doll after all.

"You're drunk," he said, taking a step forward and practically dragging Zack towards the bed. Because Zack couldn't mean it like...Zack had a _girlfriend,_ and she was probably really nice, even if she was as blind stubborn as Zack in some ways. It was probably why they got along.

"Won't be drunk for long," Zack reminded, giving Cloud these _eyes_ \--not the pathetic ones he did to get a laugh, or even the _'C'mon, a Hell House just fell on my bike on the way back from Sector Five, and I need you to hold the flashlight while I fix it'_ ones. He didn't even have words for what kind of eyes these were, but if either of them had been a girl, Cloud would probably have been well on his way to being convinced.

"You snore," he said, which wasn't even the truth, but...well, it was the eyes, wasn't it? They made him forget the whole 'you're a guy' thing.

"We could stay up," Zack offered, grinning like he knew he had Cloud flustered.

 _Guy thing, guy thing,_ he reminded himself as he dumped Zack off his shoulder and onto the bed, but what came out of his mouth was: "Girlfriend. Uh, you've got a girlfriend. Remember her?"

"Aeris?" Zack asked as Cloud knelt down to get his boots, and Cloud rolled his eyes, wanting to point out that if Zack had to _ask,_ then it was no wonder he'd spent New Year's with a friend. "I already told her about you. She thinks it's cute."

Cloud stared, wondering if this was what it felt like to be hit by a Confuse spell, and spent a blank minute trying and failing to recall the antidote to that. Antidote--that was for poison, and, uh...tranquilizers were for--

"Cloud? Hey, you okay?"

Because you didn't just go around telling your girlfriend about...about--

"Okay, look. I'm pretty sure I'm still too drunk to take advantage of you, right? And we both know you don't have to worry about _me,_ so--"

Zack's face was getting awfully close, and the hands that cupped his cheeks were already warm, even after all the time they'd spent outside. And Zack was hesitating, his eyes indecisive and kind, and he looked like he was going to sit back and rethink everything until Cloud--

He hadn't meant to lean forward, but he hadn't meant it in the same way he hadn't meant to breathe. He didn't even think about it, because some things just had to be done.

If Zack's hands were warm, his mouth was a furnace. The press of lips was light at first, weirdly gentle, not that he'd spent much time wondering what guys kissed like, or what Zack kissed like, but he was pretty sure he'd never have been able to come up with this on his own.

And then Zack's lips were parting against his own, and yes he _did_ follow Zack's lead every time; it was his curse. Only he was pretty sure that having Zack's tongue in his mouth wasn't an entirely bad thing, or even a partly bad thing, not when Zack could kiss like...like...Zack could _kiss,_ and Cloud decided to stop thinking about it and just enjoy it while it lasted.

It lasted a lot longer than he'd expected, and Cloud was breathless when Zack pulled back at last. One of Zack's hands was curled around his nape, the other resting lightly on his back, and Cloud was mbarrassed to realize he'd stretched up on both knees to get closer, kneeling between Zack's legs.

Except that Zack looked happy, really happy, not his ordinary cheerful grin but that barely-there smile that had hooked Cloud in the first place, the one that was too _good_ to be on anyone's face. You couldn't be that good or that kind, couldn't care about people the way Zack did, without it eating you up, surely...but Zack was just a little bit larger than life anyway, so maybe for him it was okay.

"Hey. Was that all right?"

Except that he asked the weirdest questions.

"Yeah," Cloud said, his voice coming out lower and rougher than he'd known it could sound. Zack seemed to like it, because his smile grew into something else, something new.

"Yeah? So why don't we get you out of these," Zack prompted, pulling at the collar of Cloud's heavy coat, "okay?"

For just a moment he thought he might panic after all. He'd never...and with _Zack_...and what if he...? But Zack just sat there smiling at him, waiting, not pushing, and Cloud took a deep breath, chilled fingers fumbling at the buttons.

Even though Zack's hands were warmer, he wasn't much quicker. Cloud would have blamed the alcohol, except that Zack kept stopping to watch him. Which wasn't helping the nervousness at _all,_ thank you. He didn't realize that he might be distracting Zack, not amusing him, until Zack gave an odd growl of frustration, shifted until he wasn't sitting on his own coat anymore, and then pulled everything off at once--coat, sweater, undershirt--and tossed it somewhere between the bed and the desk.

Cloud's fingers continued to move mindlessly, but he couldn't have said whether he was buttoning or unbuttoning.

"Cloud?" Zack asked, eyes glittering above his smile.

"Yeah?"

"Can I do that to you, too?"

"Yeah," Cloud said, lifting his arms as Zack reached down, and--to be fair, he'd have said yes to anything at that point.

His hands seemed to catch on after that, tugging at belt and zipper and-- _damn it,_ bootlaces. It probably helped that they were Zack's belt and zipper and bootlaces, because Zack's hands were a lot faster as they took care of Cloud's. The room seemed cooler by the time they'd stripped out of everything, but Zack just grinned at him and pulled him up off the floor, pulled him close.

Zack was warm _everywhere._ Cloud's first instinct was to press as close as he could to all that heat, even knowing that he'd lose it if he tried. It was enough just to lie curled on his side, legs tangled with Zack's, being kissed breathless again while a broad palm stroked slow patterns across his back. He wasn't quite sure what to do, knew for a fact that he'd die on the spot if Zack noticed, but Zack didn't seem to mind anything he tried.

So he learned the way Zack shivered when fingers slipped down his spine, that his skin was like velvet at the inner curve of his hip. Curiosity made him reach lower, fingertips grazing and then curling to fit, and when Zack pulled his mouth away on a swift inhale of breath, Cloud found himself grinning fiercely, glad to be doing this _right._

All questions of right and wrong fled as Zack pushed his hips forward, thrusting into Cloud's hand, his furnace mouth settling on Cloud's neck with a faint scrape of teeth. And gods that felt good, even better when he tipped his head back and Zack traced a path from the hollow of Cloud's throat to the point of his chin--

\--and then Zack's hand was pushing at his shoulder, pushing him down on his back. He lost his grip as Zack shifted, moving lower, and Cloud's thoughts shorted out again as he realized what was happening. Zack was making a leisurely tour of his stomach, running his tongue over muscles panic-taut because Cloud had come up on his elbows to stare, and Zack was...he was going to...and he looked _happy_ about it.

"Zack!" Cloud managed before his throat closed entirely, and Zack looked up at him through half-lowered lashes, eyes glowing even in the dim fluorescents.

"Yeah?"

"If you do that," he said shakily, "I'm going to...."

"Sounds good," Zack all but purred, and then he bent his head and Cloud lost track of everything, his world condensed to the buck of his hips, the hands that held him down, and the wet heat that enveloped him. He couldn't _stop_ moving, his fists tightening on the blanket beneath him, spine arcing off the mattress as he panted an open-mouthed moan, and he rocked up and up and was coming before he could remember to choke out another warning.

Zack didn't pull away, just gave a contented hum that made Cloud shudder all over, still too soon to be quite so interested in the way that felt. Zack looked smug, damn him, when he lifted his head at last, surveying Cloud's boneless sprawl like a job well done.

"You okay?" Zack asked, propping his cheek on his fist and his elbow on the mattress, looking far too comfortable lying there stark naked with his other arm slung across Cloud's thighs.

"Fuck, yes," Cloud said when he could remember how to speak. Zack just arched a brow at him, his grin softening to a smile. "Zack. Can...get back up here," he said, changing his mind and holding out a hand, "okay?"

He wasn't going to ask if he could do this, because Zack wouldn't have started in the first place if the answer was 'no.' Something about the not-asking made Zack relax just that tiniest bit more, and Cloud decided that Zack was probably the most confusing person he'd ever met.

That was okay, though. Zack wouldn't be Zack if he weren't completely insane.

***

It was nice not to wake up to an empty bed, no question, but waking to a groan of outraged offense was rarely a good sign. Even less so when the sound was coming from the wonderfully naked person of Cloud Strife, whose back was currently plastered to Zack's front.

"Oh, for...it's _noon,"_ Cloud muttered, untangling an arm to scrub at his face. "We slept through the entire morning."

"Told you," he said into Cloud's nape, because yeah, he _did_ remember predicting something to that effect, though it'd been more along the line of wishful thinking. He couldn't help grinning, though, because Cloud was bitching and moaning--and okay, reaching up to smack him over the head after that first failed attempt to get up--but it wasn't awkward, wasn't uncomfortable. Definitely wasn't Cloud running.

"Hey, want to go back to bed?" he asked once Cloud made it to his feet, weaving slightly in place and looking at the clothes strewn around like he wasn't quite awake enough to have mastered the fine art of getting dressed.

"Shut up," Cloud muttered without heat, like it was a reflex thing. Which it was--Cloud said it in his sleep if he heard Zack's voice.

"C'mon, one more hour."

 _"Noon,_ Zack."

"It's not like we have to get up tomorrow, either. And I _hate_ sleeping alone."

What the hell. He wasn't above begging if it got him what he wanted.

Cloud turned on him with a glare, and Zack made sure he had his most innocent face on when Cloud saw what he'd fished out from beneath the pillows and had cuddled in the crook of his arm.

Tyr's hair was a wild mess that tickled his nose, but the funny thing was, it looked exactly like Cloud's.

Growling a wordless sound of frustration, Cloud lunged for the stuffed toy with mayhem in his eyes, which was just what Zack had been hoping for. It made it damned easy to recapture the kid and haul him back into bed, cursing and snarling and all.

Now that was what Zack considered starting the New Year off right.

***

**Epilog One**

"Hey," Zack said, sliding onto the bench across from Titus in the mess hall. "Check it out. Doesn't it look just like Cloud?"

Titus didn't blink when Zack shoved the doll under the other SOLDIER's nose. Titus never blinked at anything, even when he walked in on Zack attempting to teach Sephiroth how to play poker. Gold eyes took in the Tyr plushie that was now dressed in blue to match its eyes, one brow arching slowly.

"Cloud? You mean your mascot?" Titus asked.

Zack grinned, laughter tickling at the back of his throat. "Yeah," he said, "that's the one."

Titus snorted and reached for his coffee. "It's a good thing he's sturdier than he looks."

Zack blinked, looking from the Tyr doll-turned-Cloud to Titus and back. "And what's _that_ supposed to mean?"

***

**Epilog Two**

Cloud very much hoped that he looked like he was staggering drunk, because even a non-regulation use of a Cure materia by Zack's hulking, door-opening friend hadn't entirely remedied the situation.

Not that he was _complaining,_ exactly. He knew better than to wrestle with a SOLDIER, not because Zack didn't know his own strength, but because Cloud's brain kept insisting Zack wasn't _that_ much bigger, of course he could take him, and then it was his own damn fault when he strained something trying. And then Zack had pinned _him_ , leaned in with that stupidly sweet smile and a soft question breathed into his ear, and...well, maybe Cloud had gotten a little too impatient then. A little too enthusiastic. At the time it'd been _worth it_.

Now, a long nap and a couple of hours later, that extra day off was looking more and more like a godsend.

All he really wanted at the moment was to get back to barracks, get a change of clothes, and spend the next hour under a hot shower, but luck seemed to be running against him. "Cloud!" he heard shouted behind him, and when he turned--gingerly--to look, he saw Guzman pelting up the hall like he'd been hanging around waiting for Cloud to get back.

"All right," Guz said, panting a bit as he jogged up beside Cloud, "this wasn't easy to get, and you owe Farnham ten gil, okay? Anyway," he said, reaching into his uniform jacket, "here you go. I saw you looking at it, and I figured it was only fair."

If anyone had asked him an hour ago, he'd have said that he never wanted to see a stuffed doll again.

Staring down at the Odin plushie in his hands, Cloud began to grin, thoughts of revenge circling sweetly in his head. "Yeah," he said, "I'll pay him back later. There's someone I have to embarrass royally first."

"Yeah? Well, good luck!" Guz offered, lifting a hand in a desultory wave as he turned to go. "And hey, tell Zack he can drop the girlfriend story, huh? It's not like this is Gongaga, y'know?"

Cloud looked up from the doll and frowned, unable to quite parse that for a long moment. He couldn't mean....

_"What?"_


End file.
